Rerun
by reminiscent-afterthought
Summary: [AU] A fated meeting takes place during the first Zero Reverse, and Dr. Fudo is sent back in time to stop the Momentum's creation and save his son's future. But who sent him back? Why? And when the Dark Signers and Yliaster stand in his way, how will he and his companions fight?
1. Arc 0 - Chapter 1

**A/N:** Finally, another 5D's MC, this one with a more regular update schedule planned, since it's a longer one. I'm hoping to update this bimonthly, alternating with a ZEXAL fic (otherwise I'd never touch some of my other fandoms :( ). If I don't stick to that, feel free to poke me until I do. I tend to respond to pokes.

The Arc 0 is the prologue arc; as a result, the arc and its chapters will be shorter than the others. The reason is that the two parts of the prologue don't go too well together in the same chapter, and the epilogue I currently have planned has the same problem. Splitting it like this seems to work better.

And that's about it from me. Enjoy, and let me know what you think.

* * *

**Rerun  
Arc 0: The Future Upon Them**

* * *

_An old pond;  
a frog leaps in  
the water sound_

_: An Old Pond :_

* * *

_**Chapter 1**_

By the time he had realised, the future was already upon them. Uncontrolled energy had surged through and decimated half the city in its blast. The cries of a thousand innocent souls suddenly ceasing resonated like an explosion within his ears. They drowned out the wailing of his little boy: the child that had been born just hours before, and he'd held just that once.

There wasn't time to think that he might never hold that little baby again. He closed his eyes a moment – the silence roared in his ears – and opened them again. The baby was gone – to safety, he hoped, or else he had become another of countless victims sucked up in the blast.

And the cause of it: his research, his lab, the generator – they were all gone. There was nothing but a vast expanse of black that had swallowed him whole, and for a moment he simply hung, suspended, in the air, in shock.

_Am…am I dead?_ he wondered. It wasn't an illogical assumption either; it was more feasible that he had crossed into the realm of death than his lab and its surrounding had been levelled to leave not even a trace of dust behind without touching him at all.

'Close enough,' a voice responded, much to his surprise. He could see no-one, hear nothing except his own breaths, now raspy as he strained his ears against the darkness, even as he struggled against whatever strange equivalent of gravity kept him in the air. 'You won't see me, Doctor Fudo.'

Many questions arose to his lips from that, but he kept them in check. A curious man he was, but not a foolish one. He sorted through his questions, asking first the most important one. 'Who are you?'

'I have been called many things,' the voice replied. Doctor Fudo noted its male tenor, as well as the metallic tint he had…almost as though he was automated: a machine, instead of a man.

'Indeed.' There was now a hint of amusement in the tone. 'You do your name credit, Doctor Fudo.'

The Doctor frowned at that. 'How is it you're able to read my thoughts?'

'It is not beyond my limits,' was the cryptic response. 'A great many things exist beyond the wall that appears before us.'

That raised more questions than answers, but the Doctor let it pass. 'What happened to the reactor?' was his next question.

There was a contemplative pause. 'What _will_ happen is the question you should ask, Doctor Fudo.'

'_Will_ happen?' The Doctor looked sightlessly about, despite the futility.

'In the future.' Another pause, but this time it wasn't contemplation, but…something else. 'I will show you.'

The darkness around him changed: shimmered, then lifted entirely to show two islands connected only by sea. They were like mirror images, reflections of one another: one crumbling with despair, the other bubbling with hope.

'Satellite and Neo Domino City,' the disembodied voice explained, and though the Doctor looked for speaker in the new light, he saw no other soul. 'This is the split that result from the Reverse Momentum. The split that threw half the city into the slums where they learnt despair, and the other half into the indulgence of the prospering new life they'd built, and greed.'

The Doctor frowned; he could hear bitterness in that voice, and mistrusted it.

'Oh, there was hope.' There was a hint of dark amusement with the bitterness. 'Hope in the form of a young boy from Satellite: Yusei Fudo.'

Doctor Fudo felt his breath catch in his throat at the mention of his son. 'He…he survives?' The relief is immediate: a cold wave that washes over him.

'For a time,' was the correction, which immediately caused the father's heart to plummet like stone.

'For a time?' The Doctor's throat went dry. 'How – why - ?'

'A chain reaction,' was the reply, and the scene began to move. A darkness rose out of the dilapidated island: the Satellite. It throttled the townspeople, those folk with their faces filled with despair. It throttled a dragon that briefly rose – a dragon he recognised: a key to the reactor. But it fell into the darkness too, as well as the duellist who owned it.

He saw the face, briefly. It looked just like his own._ Yusei…_

'And that is but one of many possible futures.' The voice, surprisingly, did sound sorry. 'And the kindest, perhaps.'

The scenes morphed: rewound themselves, and replayed to give different futures. Surviving the darkness that spread over Satellite, only to be killed by a friend. Surviving _that_, only to die at the hands of the one he, the father, had trusted hope and the future to.

'And even if that darkness is defeated…'

The scene changed entirely. Satellite and Neo Domino City were linked by bridges and prosperity had spread to both halves. But there was greed as well: higher violence rates, higher crime. And the terror that slowly descends, until Stardust Dragon and Yusei Fudo fall to it or fly into its heart to destroy it. Either way, no future beyond that shows his son.

And yet, Doctor Fudo finds himself unable to look away. The future had mellowed out a little: the image of false peace. Synchros flourished. The people revered the name of Yusei Fudo.

'A false peace indeed.' The voice sounded defeated now. 'Of course, it didn't last. Zero Reverse happened again.'

_Zero Reverse?_ the Doctor wondered. But he thought he knew what it meant.

'The name they gave to the Reverse Momentum.'

And this time he saw it: the blast of negative energy wiping a city off the map. He saw the people suddenly consumed and destroyed before a scream to tear from their lips: could hear the agony of thousands of souls as they suddenly ceased to exist, and the terror as the effects, this time, rippled outwards, to other reactors, other countries, until the entire world was in a similar state.

And he was staring at a ruined world in which only four people walked: the last of a desolate mankind.

Then it was darkness again, the darkness that resonated with the future's horror and despair.

Doctor Fudo was silent, thinking of what he had seen until spoken to again. 'This future can still be changed – if the root of the problem is gone.'

'The Momentum,' Doctor Fudo breathed, before the heaviness in the air stifled him again. 'It's too late; the Momentum has already – '

'The past can be changed,' the voice, still unnamed, replied. 'It _must_ be changed, before the Momentum can set the stage for these futures.'

The darkness began to lift again, but this time it gave way to nothing but dizziness. Light appeared, but it was dark, indistinct. The voice he'd been conversing it began to fade as well.

'_You_ will have to change it, by making sure the Momentum is permanently destroyed...'

And then Doctor Fudo found himself swallowed by a hazy white, with screams resonating in his ears anew as the past rewound into the present.


	2. Arc 0 - Chapter 2

_**A/N:**__ Oh wow, I actually made it…okay, one day late, but close enough. Probably the only fic that did. *shakes head* I think RL's more on line now, so hopefully the updates will behave themselves. Bimonthly was too crazy for me (ideas got cross-matched which doesn't work unless I'm trying to plan a new crossover), so we'll see how attempting monthly goes. _

_This time the focus is on Z-ONE, and I've never actually read or written about him, so this will be interesting. Enjoy. :D_

_Next chapter starts the beginning of the first arc!_

* * *

_**Rerun  
Arc 0: The Future Upon Them**_

* * *

_An old pond;  
a frog leaps in  
the water sound_

_: An Old Pond :_

* * *

_**Chapter 2**_

The Momentum had destroyed everything, including their hope. There was nothing left in his world; not even the sun came up anymore, and the temperature was slowly dropping. His heartbeat was, independently, slowing, and it was only a matter of time before one or the other killed him.

And when he died, the world would truly be dead, nothing save the graveyard of technology that no longer had mankind to control them. Water bled into the earth, wasting away because not even an ant still lived to swallow some. Trees had rotted into unfertile soil, destroyed by the miasma that continued to stifle their world.

They'd had to stop depending on food; it could not grow, and what existed was either eaten away by the scraps of life or destroyed by the machines that fulfilled their life duty of destruction. But even those were now gone; nothing moved outside; there _was_ nothing to move. Not even stars in the sky appeared, or clouds, or the sun. They were all gone.

It was technology that had let the few who'd survived the massacres live on, but technology was not infallible. They could travel through time but not turn it back. They could prolonged their lives but not make themselves immortal. They knew it would always be impossible: within their time, within their universe. So they made the choice to devote their lives and beings to preventing this catastrophe.

They tried many times. And each time ended in failure. Each time stripped away a little more of them, and of their hope. And now only he remained, clinging to the last thread of life and one last chance.

_To do what? What can I do?_

They'd been so sure that the legendary hero could save them, that he possessed the power to save them. A boy chosen by the Gods themselves; if he couldn't save them, what could?

But he couldn't. Each time loop ended in his eventual death, the world's eventual destruction. Sometimes they prevented the second Zero Reverse; something else came along and tore their peace down. Sometimes they didn't even manage that. On the rare instance his death occurred too early, at the hands of his city, his Government, or the Dark Signers.

Not once had they been able to reach a future where the world would continue to live and thrive, continue to be filled with humans, spirits, animals and plants: the symbiotic relationship the world was always meant to share. Not once had they managed to eradicate the source of their problems: the reactor. Not even the most extreme of measures had worked: the attempt to remove Duel Monsters from the face of history. And their attempt to remove the creator of the reactor had been met with even more disaster, for Yusei Fudo had also been removed from that timeline.

They didn't know why the fate of the world seemed to depend on the survival of one boy, but it did and most attempts to save their future failed because of it. And now there was only one more chance: one _last_ chance, to go back into the past and fix the future.

_Where? How?_

He didn't know, and he had little time to think about. Going to the timeline of Yusei Fudo after his powers had awakened as a Signer had been their first, and best, bet. But they'd tried that so many times. They'd even taken that Yusei to the first Zero Reverse, and the Yusei from the future to that time. None of those things had worked. They'd tried convincing Dr. Fudo to cease his research when it was young; most times he did, but someone else would pick it up and complete it. It was a fate they seemed unable to fight: the creation of the momentum that marked the destruction of not just mankind but the entire world they knew.

_What is it? What haven't we tried?_

There had to be something. Yusei: past, present and future had failed – but it wasn't Yusei who was failing. It was the strings of destiny being too many for one boy to face without snapping at least one of those strings. But that was just another thing that couldn't be changed. The momentum was destined to go off in his time. The Dark Signers were destined to awaken in his time. The Crimson Dragon was destined to come forth; the stone tablet was destined to fall from the sky – all in his time. The only thing it seemed not fated to happen in his lifetime was the destruction of their world; instead, his death was the catalyst they couldn't prevent.

In theory, all they could do was alleviate enough burdens from him for him to be able to handle the rest. But that seemed like an impossible task as well; Yusei's fate as a Signer was something that couldn't be changed; he was the only other person in the history of mankind to succeed in using Stardust Dragon's power, and he had failed to take that destiny upon him when he'd tried.

It occurred to him, then, that the person who'd created that card hadn't known its power would be tied to one man. Because that was wrong; the Signers existed in all generations; there had to be another one. But when the Signers only awoke once every five-thousand years, finding the sleeping one was like finding a needle in a haystack.

Z-ONE groaned; even if he had his cherished companions and the time he might fail to find that person. And even if they could, unleashing that power could possibly be beyond them…just as it had been impossible for him.

_There has to be a way. There just _has_ to be._

There had to be something in the past to answer that question; something in the infinite knowledge he'd amassed about that past. Yusei Fudo was central; that they'd confirmed long ago. Dr. Fudo was not, not to the creation of the reactor at least. And yet, Z-ONE recalled, that timeline had collapsed far more rapidly. In the first Zero Reverse. Completely annihilated.

_Can it be..?_

His oxygen saturation was dropping; ice was beginning to form on the tubes linked to his survival. Whichever was destined to steal his life first, he was running out of time. This was his last hope; Yusei Fudo could not save the world with a destiny of his weight on his back. Someone had to remove it; someone who could go forward and then back again in time to accelerate its flow, to bring certain events before their predestined time, to force that load to change.

It was risky, almost certainly doomed to fail. But he'd tried everything else, and he wanted to die with at least a glimmer of hope left.

_Dr. Fudo. It's up to you to save your son so he can save our future._


	3. Arc 1 - Chapter 3

_**A/N:**__ And now the first arc starts. We get a few more character introductions, along with an overloaded Doctor. :D _

* * *

_**Rerun  
Arc 1: What to Do with the Past**_

* * *

_On a withered branch  
a crow is perched  
an autumn evening._

_: A Crow at Evening :_

* * *

_**Chapter 3**_

'Doctor!'

The voice didn't sound panicked, but a mix between amused and impatient. Doctor Fudo opened his eyes and blinked; if the world was coming to an end, he didn't think there was anything amusing to be found. Unless it was a last desperate laugh – but not, it was normal, mild, amusement. Roman Goodwin if he wasn't mistaken.

Roman! He sat up sharply to find the man's unblemished and laughing expression greeting him. He hadn't seen that expression for a couple of months now, the Doctor realised. Not since stress had begun to sunk in. And now he knew the stress of what: finding a way to obtain complete control over the reactor, and reverse it, plunging Domino City into darkness.

A small portion would be saved, renamed Neo Domino City and cut apart from the ruin of what remained: the Satellite. And Satellite…Satellite would become the feeding ground of darkness: a darkness that would, eventually, consume the world.

That's right. He'd been sent back in time to stop that from happening, to stop the reactor from activating its reverse momentum.

'Is something wrong, Doctor?' Roman asked, expression melting into concern.

'I'm fine.' It wouldn't do to make him suspicious. Him of all people. 'I – err…' Unfortunately, it couldn't be helped when he didn't know exactly _when_ he'd been sent back to. He recognised his office, but his office didn't change particularly much over time and he didn't keep a calendar on his desk. There wasn't much point, with one of his assistants or his wife would alert him to any appointment he'd forget.

'The courier's arrived,' Roman said, just as the Doctor was wishing he _had_ kept a calendar on his desk, just so he'd know what day it currently was.

_Courier? What courier?_

'With your…err, baby equipment.' He looked a little awkward saying this, but his bemusement largely covered it. And Doctor Fudo laughed, because now he remembered which courier – the one that he'd ordered as soon as he'd discovered his wife's pregnancy so they'd be perfectly equipped should she go into labour while at the lab with him.

Which was exactly what had happened, the Doctor thought, amusement departing. She'd had her baby in the lab, surrounded by every one of the staff…except Roman Goodwin and the team he'd taken after being granted leadership of the reactor project. And, on the same day Yusei was born, the reactor spun in reverse, leading to the event known throughout history as Zero Reverse.

The Doctor sighed. Roman looked even more bemused – innocently bemused, and the Doctor couldn't help but accept that, knowing he was just another pawn as well. He'd seen that duel with Yusei – those times his son had emerged victorious and stopped the Dark Signers only for something else to swallow him up. He wondered fleetingly if he could find a way to save Roman too…but to do that, he'd need information. Lots of information. And to cover his tracks.

'Right,' he said, standing up, a little shakily because his body seemed to have momentarily forgot gravity while in statis. 'I'll go meet them.'

* * *

His office was soon ready and his wife and assistants were chuckling. His wife…his heart went out to her. She'd died before he had, and though he'd been fortunate to not see her body or hear her final scream, even if he was even more fortunate to now have the chance to save her, that brief tragedy ached in his heart. Worse though was the tragedy that awaited his son: a noose of destiny so tight it seemed, still, inescapable.

_How am I supposed to save us?_

'Honey?' his wife asked, looking worried. Her soft touch brushed loose hair from his forehead before dropping down to his cheek. 'Is something bothering you?'

'I – ' the Doctor began. Roman and Rex stared curiously. His wife just looked worried. Still, he couldn't say what was bothering him, couldn't tell her all about that time he, for some reason, was sure wasn't a dream. Why? Why was he so sure?

Maybe because of the weight of what lay upon it. He needed some time to let it settle in his mind, to think of what to do and plan. But he had to pretend for now: pretend that nothing had changed, that he had not come from months in the future, that the child his wife was now carrying hadn't been born the day the world began its final descent into destruction.

'Nothing,' he said finally, and knowing how weak that sounded, he added: 'Just dozed off f or a bit. Had a nightmare.'

The two Goodwin brothers made noises of sympathy and drifted off, admiring the high tech incubator, the fluffy blue and yellow crib. His wife stared at him; he managed a weak smile at her and she frowned. 'We'll talk at home,' she mouthed.

Either she'd sniffed out the lie or was concerned about the nightmare. He nodded; it wasn't a bridge he could cross now anyway. He clapped his hands instead, and the assistants looked up. 'There's work to be done.'

'Yes sir,' they both chirped, Roman a little more sombre than his brother. They dispelled after that; a mass of paperwork awaited the both of them, and as for the Doctor himself…he couldn't recall exactly, but if he was remembering right, he was slowly starting to debug the rough reactor. It was more or less built, though to call it functional would be a gross overstatement. Perhaps it was capable of the reverse momentum though, even at this stage. His blood went cold at the thought.

'Dear.' His wife looked at him. 'You're pale; perhaps you should rest.'

'No, I – ' The Doctor shook his head. 'Work is a good distraction. I'll be fine, Ama.'

Amaterasu still wore her frown, though its effect was dispelled by the heavy worry in her gaze.

'You should worry about yourself.' He touched her stomach lightly. Yusei was there, slowly forming. 'And the baby.'

'I'm fine.' She swatted his hand lightly, though she was smiling now. They'd had this argument before, and all reruns were teasing gestures from the husband. 'I'm more concerned about a certain husband of mine collapsing from his work.'

'I'm fine,' he mimicked, his heart feeling a little lighter now. This at least he could do, no matter how all else had changed, all else his mind was weighed down with.

* * *

He sat in his office afterwards, schematics spread over his desk and his mind drifting elsewhere. The schematics were important, he knew, but more important was to work out exactly what he knew, and all the things that needed his attention.

It took him most of the afternoon to make a rough timeline. The things he'd seen in statis were sketchy at best, but perhaps the most important. More factual was what had occurred between the current moment and that time. There was just over six months before the day of reckoning. In that time, he somehow had to make sure the reactor, negative momentum, Zero Reverse – none of that happened. It would be easier if the prototype hadn't already been built. The last six months had been further refining and researching it.

Unmaking a structure that already existed would not be easy. And that wasn't even the only thing that had to be done.

He chewed the edge of his pen. What he had on his side was knowledge, but that was all. He knew the bugs the reactor currently had, even if he couldn't recite them all by heart. It wouldn't take him nearly as long to find them again. It wouldn't take nearly as long to "rediscover" the danger of that reactor – but would presenting it to the council earlier tip the scales in his favour? Or was the government already corrupt? He didn't know that, having not been actively involved in the politics that surrounded the reactor until he tried to dissuade them.

That was something he'd have to look in to. Also to look in to was Roman Goodwin. He had no way of knowing yet if the man was a Dark Signer, or still in possession of his Signer heart. His powers were more straightforward, though his disguise had been difficult to notice at first glance. Still, there was a way to prove or disprove that, given the chance. Whether the Dark Signer had begun to grow or not was a different story.

Another thing he'd have to work around. If the Dark Signers didn't come together, Yusei and the other Signers would have a far easier time defeating them. It would be even less likely to turn into one of those worlds…

But what burned most fiercely in his mind was the eventual future, the common one. The way everything had ended in the same destruction, the same barren land. Whether the Dark Signers won or lost. Whether the Arc Cradle that followed after fell from the sky or did not. Whether the second Zero Reverse occurred at its predestined time or not. How could one event be such a strong catalyst? He didn't know. He didn't even know if all that he'd seen was true or not – but somehow, he trusted it. He desperately trusted it, because he had heard all those dying screams in his ears, seen that moment when the first Zero Reverse had occurred.

He shook. Somehow, he knocked his coffee cup. Brown liquid spilled over his papers, and quickly he snatched the schematics up. That wouldn't be a good way to destroy them; schematics could be made again when the actual structure existed, but they would take away the precious time his knowledge of the future had gained for him. He couldn't afford that. His notes were okay though. He'd meant for them to be destroyed anyhow. He couldn't afford anyone getting a hand on them…much less the Dark Signers or the people who had turned Roman Goodwin into one.

He put his elbow on the desk and his head in that hand. It had been hours, mere hours, and while he'd sorted out what he knew there had been nothing else. There was still so much he _didn't_ know – and even though there were things he did, like the problems with the reactor, what could he do about them? The key cards –

He paused. Those cards, the dragons of the Signers. Then he shook his head. They were also undergoing final adjustments – and even if he had them in his hand, even if they didn't become the keys to stop the reactor, something else would. And it might be something harder to control. Worse, the Signers were yet to be born.

There were too many unknown factors everywhere. He realised that, whatever move he made, he had to think it through _very_ carefully first, to make sure he didn't make things worse.

There was no way he could do this alone. He needed people he could trust. But who were they? He'd trusted Roman Goodwin before, but he couldn't be sure now. He couldn't be sure about Rex now either, after seeing the future, seeing the man who'd taken two destinies upon himself, neither of which belonged to him, to become akin to a God, and seeing him take his son's life in multiple futures, watching his son defeat the man in multiple more…but this was before that. He'd trusted Rex to keep the Signer dragons safe from the Dark Signers. He'd done that.

He gripped his hair, hard. Six months didn't seem nearly enough time, and too many things could go wrong. He'd _seen_ too many things go wrong, and that had been just a few of many different threads of future time.


	4. Arc 1 - Chapter 4

_**A/N:**__ Sorry for updating so late guys! I'd skipped July because of CampNaNo, but August was not on the list. But because of other things that happened in July, I had competition entries and exams in August that I couldn't risk putting off so I didn't wind up having the time to work on these usual monthly updates. _

_I've also rearranged a few things in the storyline. Nothing that really affects you guys, except Akiza's father is making an appearance earlier than I'd originally planned. :D_

_Enjoy!_

* * *

_**Rerun  
Arc 1: What to Do with the Past**_

* * *

_On a withered branch  
a crow is perched  
an autumn evening._

_: A Crow at Evening :_

* * *

_**Chapter 4**_

'Are you going to tell me about what's bothering you now?' Amaterasu asked her husband.

The Doctor lifted his head from his arms and blinked owlishly. His wife had just baked: warm buns overflowing with strawberries and honey, just as he loved them. And she was setting them down on the other end of the coffee table, where he'd have to abandon his papers in order to reach.

'Mean,' he said with a pout.

She laughed, before quickly frowning again. 'It's not often you don't abandon whatever it is you're reading and make a grab for my buns,' she commented. 'And that's not counting all the times you smell them baking in the kitchen.'

'I'm sorry,' he apologised, putting his notes away – a little reluctantly, but chewing his mind to bits wouldn't do anyone any good. 'I'm just having a bit of trouble with this.'

The understatement of the century, but he couldn't well explain to his wife he'd jumped six months into the past and that future he'd come from held their untimely deaths and a weight of destiny on his son's shoulders too large to bear.

'Maybe I can help,' Amaterasu offered. 'That _is_ my job after all.'

He considered, then pulled out the schematics of the reactor. That was one thing he knew he had to try and stop: the reactor malfunction. Though if it happened in the future as well, it might be impossible. But if they _could_ nullify that threat, the Nazca lines might not prematurely awaken and the Ark cradle might not descend from the sky.

She took the papers and scanned them while he bit slowly into a bun. The warm honey spread in his mouth and he let it slip down his throat, and his stomach grumbled, asking for more. He'd had a bento box at lunch, but he'd been so absorbed since he hadn't eaten anything else.

His wife smiled a bit, but it dimmed as she scanned his notes. 'Why are you trying to lock the system?' she asked. 'Is there someone on the team you don't trust?'

Of course his wife would want an explanation. 'It's not that I don't trust them,' he replied carefully – because he didn't know if he still _did_ after seeing what the future held. 'But this reactor is powerful and dangerous and I hear there's some dispute in the government. I don't want to leave the door open for it to be misused.'

'Hmm…' She glanced at the papers again, then up at him. She didn't question further though, simply following his scribbles and sketches and base calculations while he finished off the bun he'd taken and reached for another one. 'I made curry for dinner too.'

The doctor contemplated the buns before him and the delicious dinner waiting not far in the future.

'Those buns won't run away,' his wife pointed out, still reading.

'That's true.' He considered a little longer, then laughed at himself and took the plate into the kitchen. It was amusing how he was putting the same amount of thought into such little things as he was into the end of the world. He couldn't solve the problem overnight, he knew. It wasn't that simple.

He might not be able to solve it at all.

'Hiroto,' Amaterasu's voice called him from the living room. 'Don't you think Roman Goodwin would be able to help you with this?'

'No!' he cried before he could catch himself. Luckily, she couldn't see him: couldn't see the way his eyes widened in panic, the way he remembered seeing that man snatch the reactor away and unleash something so horrible from it –'

'Hiroto?' Her heels clacked on the wooden floor as she made her way over to him, and he breathed slowly and deeply, willing his suddenly fluttering heart to calm. _That hasn't happened yet…_

There was still time.

'You don't trust him.' Amaterasu's voice was questioning: worried and curious.

'I – ' he began, before shaking his head. 'He hasn't done anything yet.'

'Yet?'

Sometimes, Hiroto regretted marrying such a clever and astute woman. Because she would never let it go, and he would have to either cave in or ignore her. And she knew that as well. That stubbornness ran in both of them, and while in their field of work it was a God-send, in the case of secrets it was a devil in disguise.

'The reactor…' He cut himself off under her expecting stare, shaking his head. 'I'm just feeling uncomfortable about this reactor suddenly.'

Her frown deepened. 'That's a poor excuse,' she said, in a tone similar to a snap as she flapped the papers towards him. 'I hope you don't think I've suddenly turned into glass because I'm carrying our child.'

'Of course not,' he said hurriedly. 'It just that…I need a little more time. _Please_.'

He couldn't stop the plea from warping that last word, and his wife's expression softened upon hearing it. 'Okay,' she said, shaking her head with a sigh. 'But I expect to hear more about this soon.'

She turned to a drawer and pulled out cutlery and glasses for the both of them. The doctor hurried and grabbed the plates. He would have to tell his wife eventually, he knew – but he was still so confused about a great many things –

He wasn't lying in the least when he'd said he needed more time, and maybe his wife had picked up on that somehow.

* * *

Later that night he was working on those calculations concerning the reactor again and the phone rang, startling him. Amaterasu had retired by that point, and he'd been planning on joining her after a little more thinking and planning. Showing those calculations to his wife had been a bit of a diversion, but as he thought about it through dinner, if he could block the Goodwin brothers and the government from being able to fiddle with the reactor programme, it would allow him more leisure and peace of mind to work on the other factors.

And if he could shut down the reactor and then lock it under the guise of the "problem" discovered being the cause, he might be able to avoid scrutiny on him at the same time. But that wasn't something he could work on under another's eyes – even his wife. Not for risk of betrayal – because he knew there was no betrayal to risk from her. But for their safety. At least for now – because Amaterasu would find out eventually.

But not right then. He picked up the phone: their personal line. 'Fudo residence, Hiroto speaking.'

'It's Rex.'

Hiroto stiffened a little, before forcing himself to relax. _Nothing has happened yet_, he told himself sternly. _Nothing's happened yet_.

Besides, there were a few timelines where Rex had not succumbed to the power of the Dark Signers at all. Or fallen under Ylliaster.

He blinked suddenly. He knew how Rex had fallen under Ylliaster – through his brother. But how had Roman?

'Dr Fudo?'

'I'm sorry,' he apologised, rubbing his head. 'I've been – ' He almost let the statement hang. 'Distracted.'

'Your wife's first pregnancy will do that, I imagine.' Rex sounded sincere, and genuine. 'Sorry to call this late at night, but I've been stuck on this paper…'

Hiroto relaxed fully at that, and they spent the next half hour chatting about the string theory. It was an easy subject, and as Hiroto cast his mind around for answers for his eager assistant, he found the thoughts and words easier, like he'd had that very conversation before, sitting on the couch with legs crossed and a mug with the coffee inside slowly becoming cold. Which he had, because he'd done nothing to change that particular thread of the future – but he hadn't felt it with all he'd talked with his wife.

It was a silent message that he had to be very careful about what he did in this rerunning past.

'I'm good now, Dr Fudo.' There was the sound of rustling papers. 'Thank goodness I have no interest in old legends like my brother. To try and find traces of a five thousand year civilisation –'

'A lot of people are interested in duelling mythology,' Hiroto said automatically – before suddenly pausing. 'Which civilisation was this?'

'Uhh…' His question seemed to catch Rex off guard. 'I think it was the Sky Temple. A Pre-Incan population who worshipped the Dragon Star.'

'The Dragon Star,' Hiroto repeated, and in his mind he saw a crimson dragon appear in a burst of life above a temple.

'It's said that when the spirits sealed under the Nazca lines attacked,' Rex explained, 'the people prayed to the Dragon Star, who in turn released a crimson dragon to seal these spirits into the Nazca lines.'

'I remember hearing about that.' It was a while ago, when he'd been applying for his own PhD, attending seminars at the university and searching through all sorts of information in order to find a topic that interested him. He'd heard about the story of the Dragon Star and the Nazca lines back then, but the area that had truly fascinated him had turned out to be particle science, and that was what he'd chosen to pursue.

What else he knew about the legend came from the future when that crimson dragon and the Dark Signers awoke.

Which reminded him – and he couldn't believe he'd forgotten – the Signer dragons, those duel monsters cards – they hadn't been created yet. If memory served, they hadn't gone into development until after Roman had taken control of the project and Hiroto had been reduced to a mere assistant, only able to watch from afar.

There had been four dragons. Hiroto tried to remember what they looked like, but Rex was still talking. 'I'll just add these new notes and then I think I'll turn in for the night.' He yawned to prove his point.

'That sounds like a good idea.' Hiroto looked at the clock. 'Ama told me to go up almost an hour ago.'

Rex laughed at that. 'You shouldn't keep her waiting too much longer then.'

But Hiroto had something new to think about now, and even after Rex had hung up he pondered over it. _Those four dragons…_ He knew one had belonged to Yusei, and that was the one he remembered most easily. He'd heard that name shouted across multiple timelines, and seen that shimmering light blue dragon cutting through the air. That was Stardust Dragon – but the other three, he hadn't paid nearly as much attention to them, and he couldn't remember.

'One was a red dragon,' he mumbled to himself. 'A little demonic…but more flames than ill-intent…' He frowned, but when he couldn't remember the name he tried the next. 'Black skin, and pink rose petals – Black Rose Dragon?' He wondered if that name was just wishful thinking on his part, but wrote it down anyway. 'And then the other one.' He hadn't seen that one very clearly at all – and why hadn't he read the names of the cards when he'd had them in his hand?

Of course, he'd been busy running away with them to think about doing that. He shook his head again. 'A blue body again…and light, colourful wings.' He thought of his wife's favourite card suddenly: the Fairy Archer whose design was splashed with colour. 'Something Fairy Dragon?'

And try as he did, he couldn't remember a single detail beyond that. And sleep started tugging at his eyes soon enough, so he decided to turn in for the night. Hopefully when he awoke, refreshed, in the morning he would think of something new. But now he had three major goals to pursue: to collect everything he'd learnt about the future and change it to avoid the doom that seemed to await at every possible future tried out so far, to make sure the reactor doesn't initiate the Zero Reverse that would solidify the doom of their world, and to create these Signer dragons and the keys to the Ener-D reactor and keep them out of Roman's reach.

Because if he didn't create them first, Roman would.

He caught that thought. Roman hadn't yet done anything, and yet he was distrusting him so. _But I can't help it_, he thought, rubbing his forward. Not while knowing what had happen in the future between them – and in regards to the fate of the world.

_Unless there's a way to divert him…_

But without knowing the catalyst, that would be an even harder job than keeping the Ener-D reactor under control.


End file.
